[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----N.H., VA., N.C., MISS., KY., NEB.

[Rick Halperin]

May 20




NEW HAMPSHIRE:

Death penalty foes deliver petition to governor



Death penalty opponents have delivered a petition with more than 50,000 
signatures to Gov. Chris Sununu, urging him to sign the death penalty repeal 
that has passed both House and Senate by large, but not veto-proof, margins.

Sununu has said he plans to veto the bill, largely in response to opposition 
from law enforcement and the families of murder victims.

But several of those families appeared at a State House news conference on 
Thursday before delivering their petitions, regarding SB 593, the death penalty 
repeal bill.

Among the speakers was Andrea LeBlanc, who lost her husband, a UNH professor, 
in the 2nd plane to hit the World Trade Center on 9/11.

Others included state Rep. Robert "Renny" Cushing, D-Hampton, who lost his 
father and brother-in-law to murder, and Margaret Hawthorn, whose daughter was 
shot and killed at her home in Henniker in 2010.

Sununu has promised to veto SB 593, which proposes replacing the death penalty 
with the sentence of life in prison without parole for the crimes that fall 
under the state's narrow capital murder statute.

A 2/3 majority of lawmakers present and voting will be needed to override a 
veto. The Senate was just 2 votes short of the 16 votes needed to override when 
it voted in March, and the House was just 1 vote shy of override numbers when 
it voted in April.

If there is a veto override vote taken, attendance will be the key factor as it 
will likely happen this summer.

The state's death penalty has not been used since 1939, and no one was on death 
row for decades until Michael Addison was convicted in the murder of Manchester 
police officer Michael Briggs in 2008.

The prospect of Addison's sentence being reduced to life in prison without the 
possibility of parole dominated much of the debate, with repeal opponents 
calling for justice on behalf of the officer's family.

Cushing said last week he is confident the House will have the votes to 
override a veto, and hopeful that 2 Senate votes can be swayed.

"Gov. Sununu should respect the will of our state's duly elected legislators, 
including many members of his own party, who have spoken loudly and clearly 
that New Hampshire can live without the death penalty," he said.

The bill is still awaiting key signatures from legislative leaders before it 
can be enrolled for submission to the governor, after which he will have 5 days 
to sign, veto or let the bill become law without his signature.

(source: Union Leader)








VIRGINIA:

Lawyers in Death-Penalty Case Seek Answers on Mental Fitness



Defense lawyers for a man facing a possible death penalty in the slaying of a 
Muslim teenager last year say their client likely suffers intellectual 
disabilities.

The court filing from lawyers for 23-year-old Darwin Martinez-Torres of 
Sterling seeks appointment of an expert to evaluate whether he has the mental 
capacity to face capital punishment.

The Washington Post reports an initial evaluation by a neuropsychologist found 
Torres suffers from poor memory and impaired judgment, and is functionally 
illiterate.

Martinez-Torres is charged with capital murder and rape in the 2017 killing of 
17-year-old Nabra Hassanen. She was attacked while walking back to a mosque 
with friends ahead of a pre-dawn Ramadan service in northern Virginia.

A judge will hear arguments on the request later this month. The trial is 
scheduled for January.

(source: Associated Press)








NORTH CAROLINA:

Why We Can't Have Nice Things on Death Row----Not even an extra boiled egg.



It never fails: Whenever those of us on death row are granted even the smallest 
blessing, favor or minor look-out, one of our fellow prisoners comes along and 
screws it up for everyone.

This article was published in collaboration with Vice.

Sometimes it's a matter of greed. Other times it's pure nastiness. Then there 
is stupidity, for which there is little excuse. As if being condemned to die 
isn't enough, some seem to believe we should continue to heap punishment upon 
ourselves.

Take what happened with our gym equipment: Years ago, we could work out with 
weights, but this privilege was taken away after an altercation during which 
one malcontent bashed another in the head with a dumbbell, nearly killing him. 
When I first arrived on the row nearly 18 years back, this kind of thing was a 
never-ending source of frustration and anger for me. With the passage of time, 
I have come to accept that it's just the way things are. Still, there are 
moments when I can only shake my head with disgust.

This morning was one of those times.

The newly-constructed Central Prison chow hall isn't too unlike a school or 
hospital cafeteria, except for the rows of steel tables bolted to the floor, 
and the small waist-high window from which trays are served. We don't see the 
regular-population prisoners who work in the kitchen unless we bend down to 
look through the serving window, and this is frowned upon by the gray and 
black-uniformed correctional officers, or C.O.s, who usually lurk somewhere 
nearby. The tables are dirty, the floor sticky and strewn with crumbs, used 
plastic sporks, and other detritus.

As we stood in the breakfast line, my buddy Greg, up front as usual, turned to 
announce: "Man behind the serving line says he's gonna look-out for everyone 
with a boiled egg and piece of cheese. It ain't on the menu, so don't bitch 
'cause you only get 1 egg."

Enough said. It felt like the universe was smiling upon us. A boiled egg and 
slice of cheese would go well with the S.O.S. - that's "shit on a shingle," or 
the chipped beef and biscuits that were on the menu - and would make an 
otherwise bland, pitiful breakfast much better. I waited my turn, grateful that 
the server would risk trouble by providing us with extra food. When a tray 
appeared in the window, I grabbed it and made my way to the table where Greg 
was already seated.

Watching the line as I began to eat, I saw Jazzy Jimmy approach the window.

"I bet ol' Jazzy'll try to sell his egg," I predicted. "One boiled egg - with 
shell - for a stamped envelope."

"Oh, he'll try to get more than that," Greg said with a chuckle.

Jazzy Jimmy is a 60-something man who acts as if his 12th birthday is still a 
few years off. He fancies himself a singer, a rapper, a musician, and an 
all-around entertainer, but is, in reality, a minor annoyance. If not for his 
blatant narcissism and penchant for telling dubious stories about having once 
performed with James Brown, his behavior might be endearing.

After a short wait, Jazzy took his tray and began to walk away before halting 
mid-stride. "Wait a minute, I only got 1 egg," he said, looking down at his 
tray. He then turned back to the serving window and bent down to speak to the 
prisoner behind the line. "You only gave me 1 egg. Ain't we s'posed to get 2?"

"You idiot!" yelled Little Chuck from across the cafeteria. "Everybody got 1 
egg. Don't you listen?"

"But ... but ... ," Jazzy looked crestfallen. There went his opportunity to 
make an extra stamped envelope.

By this time, a C.O. - alerted by the scene Jazzy had caused - made her way to 
the window and called for the kitchen steward. The stewards are uniformed 
correctional officers tasked with overseeing the prisoners who prepare and 
serve our meals. "What's going on here?' the C.O. demanded. "Are they supposed 
to get 1 egg or 2?"

"They aren't supposed to get any eggs. Eggs aren't even on the menu!"

The kitchen steward was on the verge of a full-blown rage, his round face 
glowing bright red. "I'll see to it that somebody goes to lockup for this." He 
stomped away from the window to apprehend the server responsible for this 
terrible misdeed.

"Way to go, asshole." An inmate called Mean Joe's voice broke the silence left 
in the wake of the steward???s departure. "You'd fuck up a wet dream."

The abuse continued from every corner of the cafeteria. As Jazzy Jimmy ate his 
breakfast in silence, not seeming to care, I wondered: Is it possible to 
dislike someone and feel sorry for him at the same time?

Lunch was a turkey-ham and cheese sandwich with vegetable soup, and, 
predictably, the steward loomed at the serving window handing out trays. Under 
his close watch, nary an extra piece of turkey-ham or spoonful of soup got past 
him. In fact, we were lucky to receive what little the menu allotted.

Thanks a lot, Jazzy Jimmy.

(source: Timothy White, 40, is on death row at Central Prison in Raleigh, N.C., 
where he is awaiting execution for 1st-degree murder; he pleaded guilty in 
2000----themarshallproject.org)








MISSISSIPPI:

Post Mortem - the execution of Edward Earl Johnson



31 years ago, on May 20, 1987, just before midnight, I was sitting in the 
witness area of the Mississippi Gas Chamber watching someone die in front of 
me. His name was Edward Earl Johnson.

I am both sad and glad that Edward's final 2 weeks, right up to his agonising 
death, were recorded in Paul Hamann's extraordinary BBC documentary Fourteen 
Days in May. Sad, because from time to time I find myself forced to relive that 
horror, when I watch the film at some public event; glad, because at least 
Edward's senseless death has had positive repercussions - the film inspiring 
many to take up the battle for people in his precarious predicament.

Yet it irks me beyond measure that people who should know better use their 
position of power to prognosticate that the justice system never executes the 
innocent. For example, in a case called Kansas v. March, in 2006, U.S. Supreme 
Court Justice Antonin Scalia loudly proclaimed that there is not "a single case 
- not one - in which it is clear that a person was executed for a crime he did 
not commit."

Of course, in a way it is not surprising that Justice Scalia made his foolish 
statement. After all, he did not think his job included protecting an innocent 
person from the Chamber. In Herrera v. Collins he opined that "there is no 
basis ... for finding in the Constitution a right to demand judicial 
consideration of newly discovered evidence of innocence brought forward after 
conviction." What he meant in plain English was that the Supreme Court should 
not stop an execution merely because someone was innocent. This remains the law 
today, which makes it particularly difficult to prove that a prisoner did not 
commit the crime once the jurors have made their original mistake.

When we do try, the prosecution invariably turns to Justice Scalia's words and 
responds as they did last week in the case of Kris Maharaj, the British man 
sentenced to death for a crime he did not commit in Miami in 1986. "Claims of 
actual innocence based on newly discovered evidence," the assistant attorney 
general assured the federal court, "have never been held to state a ground for 
federal habeas relief."

"pray for the dead and fight like hell for the living."

On February 13, 2016, Justice Scalia died, leaving this as his sorry legacy. He 
cannot change his foolish opinions now that he is dead; and neither can an 
executed prisoner clear his name post mortem because his innocence has become 
"moot" in the quaint terminology of the court.

The labour activist Mother Jones admonished us to "pray for the dead and fight 
like hell for the living." For 3 decades, I have followed her advice, but I 
wonder if it is not time to change. I am thinking we need to fight like hell 
for some of the dead. They have no voice, and they never had one.

Since the U.S. resumed executions in 1977, we have exonerated 162 people who 
were sentenced to death - fully 1 for every 9 people executed. At each of 162 
trials, 12 jurors were convinced beyond a reasonable doubt of their decision - 
so sure that they imposed death. Yet we are meant to believe that somehow they 
got it right every time someone got through to the Chamber? This is no more 
than an executioner's wishful thinking.

Edward was innocent and I watched him choke to death. I encountered a young 
African American woman at the time of Edward's funeral who said she had been 
with him at the time of the murder of Walnut Grove Town Marshall J.T. Trest. 
She had, she said, been to the (white) police to tell them he could not have 
done it, but they told her to mind her own business. I later spoke with 
Governor Bill Allain, the guilt-ridden Catholic who denied Edward clemency. He 
told him how a local white woman had come to him to tell him who actually 
committed the crime, and why. I have some guilt myself, since I was very young 
and inexperienced in 1987, and if I knew then what I know now, Edward would be 
alive today no matter what everyone else did or did not do.

If I knew then what I know now, Edward would be alive today

However, it is time for us to prove our point - beyond my personal experience. 
It is time to prove, for example, that in 2004 Cameron Todd Willingham was 
executed for the tragic deaths of his children in a fire that was wrongly 
determined by an expert, now debunked, to be arson. Can you imagine the 
primordial horror when a parent finds himself unable to save his 3 kids from 
the fire - 2-year-old Amber and 1-year-old twins Karmon and Kameron. Yet this 
was followed by a sanctimonious prosecutor painting falsely him as a 
premeditated killer, sending him for 13 years on death row before attending his 
execution.

And so I could go on through many cases. Meanwhile, as I take a moment today to 
reflect on how I failed Edward Johnson, I feel I have a duty to nail the coffin 
firmly shut on his conviction: his name, and the names of many others, need 
finally to be cleared beyond all doubt.

(source: reprieve.org.uk)








KENTUCKY:

Allen man accused of killing 3 relatives to appear in court Tuesday



A man accused in the triple homicide of his grandparents and an uncle will make 
his 1st Allen County court appearance Tuesday.

Edward Dilon Siddens, 28, of Scottsville, will be arraigned in Allen Circuit 
Court on 3 counts of murder (domestic violence), theft by unlawful taking (auto 
valued at $500 or more but less than $10,000), violation of a Kentucky 
E.P.O./D.V.O. and a separate indictment charging him with convicted felon in 
possession of a firearm and convicted felon in possession of a handgun.

Siddens is suspected of fatally shooting Jimmy Neal Siddens, 73; his wife, 
Helen Siddens, 72; and their son, Jimmy Neal Siddens II, 41.

Their bodies were found Feb. 19 outside their home on Ray Pardue Road in 
Scottsville.

Edward Siddens was captured Feb. 20 by authorities in Colorado after leading 
law enforcement there on a pursuit, according to Kentucky State Police.

He did not sign extradition paperwork during a court hearing later that week in 
Colorado, and remained jailed there for several days until he was transferred 
to custody in Kentucky.

Siddens is being held in Christian County Detention Center under a $3 million 
cash bond.

Jimmy Neal and Helen Siddens were members of New Bethel Missionary Baptist 
Church, where Jimmy Neal served as a deacon. He was also on the board of Cedar 
Spring Volunteer Fire Department No. 2.

Jimmy Neal had been a beef cattle farmer and a truck driver, and Helen Siddens 
worked for Houchens Industries before enrolling in beauty school and becoming a 
hairdresser in Fountain Run.

They were both retired.

Court records show police learned that a 2004 Ford F-250 belonging to Jimmy 
Neal Siddens was missing and that his bank card had been used in Iowa on Feb. 
19. Several firearms were also missing from the residence.

Edward Siddens had a history of violence toward his grandparents, records show.

In 2015, Edward Siddens was given a 2-year prison sentence for holding a gun to 
the back of his grandfather's head in September 2014 and threatening to kill 
him.

He pleaded guilty in that case to 1st-degree wanton endangerment, carrying a 
concealed deadly weapon, 3rd-degree terroristic threatening and 2nd-degree 
disorderly conduct.

The court ordered him to have no physical contact with his grandparents.

2 years later, in August 2017, Helen Siddens filed in Allen District Court for, 
and received, a domestic violence order of protection against Edward Siddens, 
court records show.

Edward Siddens was ordered to have no contact with his grandmother until Aug. 
22, 2020.

During the course of the investigation, KSP filed requests for search warrants 
for a Facebook account belonging to Edward Siddens and cellphone numbers he was 
known to use

Police learned from his mother, Shelley Siddens, that she suspected Edward 
Siddens killed his grandparents and their son.

"Shelley Siddens went on to state Edward Siddens had made threats before to 
harm her father and also her," KSP Detective Adam Morgan said in an affidavit 
supporting a search warrant.

Investigators learned from one of Edward Siddens' friends about a cellphone 
number he was known to use, and obtained a search warrant for a continuous ping 
on the phone's location.

KSP Detective Sgt. Chad Winn stated in an affidavit for the search warrant for 
the continuous ping that Siddens was considered "armed and dangerous" and "time 
is of the essence."

The cellphone pinged in Colorado and a member of the Sedgwick County (Colo.) 
Sheriff's Department located the missing truck, engaging in a pursuit that 
ended with the arrest.

"Deputy Carlton Britton with Sedgwick County Sheriff's Department stated 
multiple firearms were in plain view," Morgan said in an affidavit for a search 
warrant. "Edward Siddens made a spontaneous statement 'the owner of the vehicle 
is no longer with us.'"

He confessed to the shooting deaths of his grandparents and uncle after being 
taken into custody and advised of his rights, court records show.

The case is eligible under state law for the death penalty due to there being a 
homicide with multiple victims.

The decision to pursue the death penalty or other aggravated sentencing rests 
with Allen County Commonwealth's Attorney Clint Willis.

(source: Bowling Green Daily News)








NEBRASKA:

Arrogance killed execution ban



The arrogance of Gov. Pete Ricketts sticks in my craw.

We have a unicameral legislature which is officially non-partisan, and the 
longer I watch politics at the state and national levels, the more I like our 
system. Yet we have a governor, sworn to uphold Nebraska law and morally 
obligated to try to make our system work, who shows utter contempt for the 
design of our Legislature and the way it has functioned for many decades.

The recent case of the death penalty in Nebraska is to the point. The 
Legislature is composed of people who actually sat down together and studied 
and argued the pluses and minuses of having a death penalty.

After serious debate and study, they decided to replace it with life without 
parole instead. Perhaps they were influenced by studies like one done in 2014 
by the National Academy of Sciences, which concluded that 4 % -- that's 4 % -- 
of those convicted of capital murder in the U.S. are innocent!

The governor vetoed the law, and his veto was overridden. So instead of 
deciding maybe he needed to study the issue as the legislators had done, he 
spent hundreds of thousands of dollars of his family's money and got it on the 
ballot -- so people who formed their opinion on the issue by talking with 
like-minded souls in the coffee shop could vote on it and overturn what their 
own representatives had decided after actually studying the issue in depth.

That's arrogance!

Dan Howell, Lincoln

(source: Letter to the Editor, Lincoln Journal Star)